Action / Drama / Film-Noir / Romance

Synopsis

Well-to-do Chicagoan, Larry Darrell, breaks off his engagement to Isabel and travels the world seeking enlightenment, eventually finding his guru India. Isabel marries Gray, and following the crash of 1929, is invited to live in Paris with her rich, social climbing, Uncle Elliot. During a sojurn there, Larry, having attained his goal, is reunited with Isabel. While slumming one night Larry, Isabel and company are shocked to discover Sophie, a friend from Chicago. Having lost her husband and child in a tragic accident, Sophie is living the low-life with the help of drugs and an abusive brute. Larry tries to rehabilitate her, but his efforts are sabotaged by Isabel who tries in vain to reignite Larry's interest in herself.

Well-to-do Chicagoan, Larry Darrell, breaks off his engagement to Isabel and travels the world seeking enlightenment, eventually finding his guru India. Isabel marries Gray, and following the crash of 1929, is invited to live in Paris with her rich, social climbing, Uncle Elliot. During a sojurn there, Larry, having attained his goal, is reunited with Isabel. While slumming one night Larry, Isabel and company are shocked to discover Sophie, a friend from Chicago. Having lost her husband and child in a tragic accident, Sophie is living the low-life with the help of drugs and an abusive brute. Larry tries to rehabilitate her, but his efforts are sabotaged by Isabel who tries in vain to reignite Larry's interest in herself.

Tech specs

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by bkoganbing9 / 10

Ty goes to Shangri-La

Darryl Zanuck gave in to Tyrone Power's request for some serious acting
roles and not another costume part in his first post World War II film
after returning from the Marines. The Razor's Edge is a bit overlong,
but Tyrone Power and the rest of the cast is shown to best advantage.

The Razor's Edge is the story about a returning World War I veteran's
quest for spiritual meaning in his life. Author W. Somerset Maugham
wrote this during the 30s and his themes then found a good audience in
1946. He appears in the movie, played by Herbert Marshall, and it is
his eyes through which we see the action unfold.

It starts at a party in the Midwest at the beginning of the Roaring
20s. All the principal characters are introduced there including Larry
Darrell, played by Power, who wants to postpone his engagement to Gene
Tierney. Power explains about his lack of spiritual fulfillment and his
desire to do some global soul searching. Tierney's not happy, but she
thinks all he wants to do is sow some wild oats and she reluctantly
acquiesces.

A year later she's in Paris and she finds Ty living on the fringe and
she realizes he was serious. Now Tierney is hopping mad so she marries
steady and reliable John Payne. Now the plot unfolds.

As I've said in other reviews of his films Power was either the
straight arrow hero or a hero/heel type. He's a straight arrow in this
one as noble as you can get without crossing over into Dudley
DooRightism.

Gene Tierney had essayed bitchiness in Leave Her to Heaven and she
refines it to a high art here. Even though she's married to Payne, she
still has a yen for Ty and her machinations are what drives the rest of
the story.

John Payne, I have always been convinced was brought to 20th Century
Fox as a singing Tyrone Power for musicals. So it is interesting to see
them together. It is unfortunate that Payne wasn't given a better role
because his part as Tierney's husband who loses his fortune in the
Stock Market Crash wasn't better written. Payne proved on a lot of
occasions he was a capable enough actor to handle more complex parts.

Clifton Webb plays fussy Uncle Elliott Templeton and got an Oscar
Nomination, losing to Harold Russell in the Best Years of Our Lives.
Webb was the closest thing for years to an out gay actor and a lot of
his roles reflect that part of him, like this one. My favorite scene is
after Ty Power goes to India and in that Shangri La like lamasery feels
he has been made spiritually aware, with the symphonic crescendos
rising, the action cuts away to a Paris tailor shop where Clifton Webb
is complaining that the tassel on his robe doesn't sway, but that it
bobbles.

Anne Baxter won a Best Supporting Actress Award for a playing a friend
of Tierney's in the mid west. Baxter is a happy girl, marrying a young
man she's deeply in love with. Her husband and baby are killed in an
automobile crash. Baxter's study of physical and moral decline and
degradation is some of her best work, maybe even better than Eve
Harrington in All About Eve.

The story is a bit dated now, but it's still a fine film and one that
shows Tyrone Power capable of far more than swashbuckling.

Reviewed by blanche-210 / 10

a coming of age film

This film, and the book on which it is based, made strong impressions on me in my youth, but even more so now that I am past middle age. A magnificent cast - Tyrone Power, Gene Tierney, Anne Baxter, Clifton Webb, John Payne, Herbert Marshall, help to tell the story of a man who walks "in another man's shoes" -- and totally to his own drummer -- after the first world war. In his quest for spirituality and goodness, he is at odds with the materialism and obsession around him. The different layers of "The Razor's Edge" demand attention: Larry's physical desire for Isabel, a woman it turns out he doesn't even know; Isabel's cold-heartedness and desire to possess Larry; and Larry's search for the meaning of life, while the people he loves disintegrate around him from lack of values or hope. These are all seen through the eyes of Somerset Maugham, played by Marshall. Larry's final confrontation scene with Isabel (Tierney) about Sophie (Baxter) is bone-chilling -- Power, who had a tendency to be sometimes stiff and a bit removed from his material, uses that flaw to excellent advantage as Larry Darrell. It's not a showy role, but he's wonderful, and he's reading of poetry in Sophie's room is unforgettable.

Highly recommended.

Reviewed by guil fisher5 / 10

Best of the best!

This has got to be one of my favorite films of all. It ranks in my books up there with PLACE IN THE SUN, REAP THE WILD WIND and THE HURRICANE.

Made in the 40s by 20th Century Fox and Producer Darryl F. Zanuck, it stars Tyrone Power as Larry Farrell, a man on a journey to find the values of life. This fascinating journey takes him all over the world until he reaches a summit in India and there he meets a Holy Man, superbly played by Cecil Humphreys, who helps him understand his questions and then sends him back to the real world where he must then take his place in life. Based on the 1943 book of the same name, by W. Somerset Maugham, it does the story justice with the help of Lamar Trotti in transferring it to the screen. I read the book before seeing the film and was not disappointed. Congratulations also goes to director, Edmound Goulding for bringing the truth of the book to life.

Other noteworthy performances were delivered by the lovely Gene Tierney, as Isabel, again in Cassini dresses, and yet another co-starring Tyrone Power film; John Payne, as Gray, in a different type of role as Miss Tierney's husband, Anne Baxter, as the doomed Sophie, in her Academy Award performance, and was she excellent, Clifton Webb as Elliott Templeton, another of Webb's limp-wristed performances and another Academy Award nomination. Herbert Marshall as Maugham himself. Did anyone get the "gay" relationship between he and Templeton? Then there's Lucile Watson, Frank Gilmore and the delightful Elsa Lanchester in supporting roles. I liked Fritz Kortner as Kosti, the de-frocked priest Larry meets at a bar when he is working the mines.

Ray Dorey along with Alfred Newman wrote the theme song "Mam'selle" for the film. This is the best of the times. You can't get better. Power was superb in this. He was an underrated actor because he was such a handsome man. Yet, his abilities as an actor were terrific. He brought the intelligence of Maugham's writing to focus. Miss Baxter showed you the stuff good performers are made of with her shaded performance in this film. Also watch Marshall's reactions. His eyes are fantastic. They way his looks go from actor to actor. And look for the gay undertones between he and Clifton Webb as the eccentric uncle who delves in the upper crust life. Even to the extreme of having a coat of arms embroidered on his underwear. In the final minutes of the film Marshall speaks to Isabel after Larry leaves her for good, saying, "Goodness is, after all, the greatest force in the world . . .and he's got it." This speaks for the film and it's greatness. I think Marshall should have been nominated for his underplayed performance. He is credited with many fine roles in his career. See this classic. It's on VHS. Not to be confused with the pale remake with Bill Murray.